


i'll see you when i wake

by therjolras



Category: Fantastic Four (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fluff and Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-24
Updated: 2015-09-24
Packaged: 2018-04-23 05:57:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4865600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/therjolras/pseuds/therjolras
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ben Grimm is always in pain.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i'll see you when i wake

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jo_Girard](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jo_Girard/gifts).



Ben Grimm is always in pain.

 

He tells Reed that he’s grown accustomed to it and it’s true, he’s found a way to work through the burning feeling that never seems to fade out. That doesn’t mean he can forget. he’s done some research about living with chronic pain, mostly since the four of them settled into life at the new institute, and he’s found out that it’s possible. That’s it. So far he hasn’t found any endgame. His life’s a perpetual state of ‘now what?’

 

Funny, when he thought about his future at the end of twelfth grade he did see his life grinding to a halt, but not like this. On the one hand, he’s not splitting his life between community college and the junkyard, coming back to a shitty apartment to watch football and drink shitty beer without bothering to wash off the grime. He’ll admit to missing that damn junkyard and the backbreaking work that came with it. He misses the smell of home, the smell of rust and grease and blood and occasionally refuse. He misses his dogs. He misses feeling _human._

 

On the other hand, though, Reed’s here. Despite everything else-- despite the pain and the lack of sensory input the way sensory input should be experienced and fucking Johnny setting things on fire in the middle of the night-- Reed’s here. Whenever Ben thought about his future before, he hadn’t really thought Reed would be part of it.

 

“Ben?”

 

He opens his eyes. There’s a pair of small feet directly his left; when he looks up, he learns they are attached to Sue. Like most of the time, she looks tired and wan and more than a little concerned about nothing in particular, probably. When Ben catches her eye, she relaxes a little. “You okay, Ben?” She says.

 

“Just thinking,” Ben replies. He looks back down at his feet, dangling over the edge of the patio into open air. Sue makes a _hmm_ ing noise.

 

“Well,” she says, “Johnny’s ordered dinner, he sent me to come find you while he coaxes Reed out of the lab. You hungry?”

 

“Sure,” Ben says. It’s a lie. He’s rarely hungry these days. Reed will be there, though, if Johnny’s skill is anything to go by. A little prickle of jealousy opens up in the pit of his stomach at the thought. “Yeah, I’ll come,” he says, and heaves himself up, hoping to distract himself from his jealousy. It’s not like it’ll work, but a man can try.

 

They walk side by side, normally-small Sue dwarfed in comparison to Ben. The ceilings at the so-called institute are high, high enough that Ben never has to hunch over, but he’s always afraid he’s going to dent the floor. The door to their shared quarters is open, and voices leak out into the hall; when Ben nudges the door open, the trickle becomes a stream. Reed and Johnny are already home, bickering across the kitchen island about what’s probably something sciency. Ben’s no idiot, he knows the jargon, but he’s content to let the words become an inane jumble of syllables as he examines the pickings. Chinese takeout again.

 

“Damn it, Storm, really?” He says. Johnny and Reed both snap back to the world outside their conversation, and Reed grins when he sees Ben.

  
“Hey, buddy,” he says. “Do me a favor and tell Johnny Spider-Man is cooler than Captain America?”

 

“Spider-Man is cooler than Captain America,” Ben repeats in Johnny’s direction. Then he adds to Reed, “Again, Reed?”

 

Reed gives him a sheepish smile. Then his eyes flit past past Ben to the cartons of Chinese food and back to Ben. When he gets back, his expression is horrified. “Ben, I’m so sorry, the chopsticks--”

 

“It’s okay,” Ben says quickly. “I wasn’t really hungry. I just wanted to see if Johnny had really magicked you out of the lab.” Reed laughs  at that.

 

“It’s a dangerous world in there,” he says. “Why don’t you come down? You can see what I’m working on--”

 

“Nah,” Ben says. “Feel like a bull in a china shop down there, you know?” Reed winces. Ben winces, too, for another reason: an acute stab of pain has launched an attack on his head.

 

Then another, then another. It _hurts_ , oh god Ben thought he was used to this, he can hear Reed and Sue and Johnny’s voices mingling together, and someone calling his name and an insistent mechanical beeping that feels like it’s stabbing at his ears

 

==

 

He’s awake. He’s awake and he’s screaming and something’s stabbing into his head, he can feel the weight of it, it _hurts_ but there’s another feeling, something cool and peaceful, and he can’t his keep his head above water

 

==

 

He wakes again, and everything is still. He can hear the beeping again, mechanical and shrill, but it’s softer now. He’s lying flat on his back, and he can feel cool smooth material against his bare skin. Not leather. Maybe nylon? Plastic? He opens his eyes, and squeezes them shut again with a groan of pain. It hurts to see, it’s so bright.

 

“Ben?” Says a voice. It’s feminine. Vaguely familiar. Hadn’t Reed sent him a clip of something with that voice in it just a few days ago? One of his friends from the Baxter institute, maybe?

 

“Ben Grimm, can you hear me?”

 

“Yes,” he croaks. His throat is dry. “Where’s Reed?” Something about Reed. What’s wrong with Reed? How does he know something’s wrong with Reed?

 

“You’re--” she hesitates. Is it a she? “You’re in area 57,” she says. “Location classified. Reed’s here too, he’s okay. Do you remember what happened to you?”

 

Area 57 sounds familiar, like something out of a dream. “I don’t remember,” Ben says. “I remember--” Reed calling him, drunkenly excited, begging Ben to come. _I can’t do this without you_. He wanted Ben to come to… to the Baxter institute. Reed was doing a project at the Baxter institute, he had a full scholarship, he was working on the device, the one he and Ben had been working on since forever. Reed couldn’t do it without him--

 

“The teleporter!” He blurts out. “Reed wanted me to come with him, it didn’t feel right otherwise. And something… something went wrong…” He pries his eyes open, looking for the girl talking to him. He can’t see her. “What went wrong?” He says. “Is Reed really okay? Is he--”

 

“Yes, he’s okay,” she says. Ben focuses on the sound of her voice and finds her by his bedside, small and blonde and wan. Something clicks.

 

“Sue,” he says. “You’re Sue Storm, Reed’s friend. You came with Doc Storm to the science fair last summer.” Ben hated that summer. Everything he and Reed did together was permeated by that fact that Reed was leaving, Reed was leaving, Reed was leaving.

 

“You’re Ben Grimm,” she says. “Reed’s boyfriend.”

 

“I’m not--” he says. She snorts.

 

“Not with the way he talks about you,” she says. “It’s like he gets little stars in his eyes every time he starts up. _‘Oh, Ben and I…’ ‘Ben and I used to do this…’ ‘Ben says…’_ ” She says it in a tone that conveys both exasperation and affection. Ben recognizes it from half his life spent in Reed’s company.

 

“What happened to us?” He says finally. Sue pauses for a long, sad moment.

 

“The transport pods didn’t close all the way on the return trip,” she says. “Three of you-- Reed, my brother, and you-- suffered serious chemical burns, abrasions, and possible contamination. According to Reed, the fourth didn’t make it out. You met Victor?”

 

The name rings a bell. Ben tells her so. Then he says, “How long was I out?”

 

“Four weeks,” she says. “Reed was awake almost immediately. My brother-- Johnny-- is still in critical condition.”

 

“I’m sorry,” Ben says. He remembers Johnny-- at least remembers liking him.

 

“It’s not your fault,” she says.

 

“Not yours, either,” Ben says. “From what I remember, it’s that guy Victor’s fault.”

 

“That’s real reassuring,” she says. Then the door opens, and she steps away as Ben’s set upon by a team of people asking him how he feels.

 

“Like shit,” he says. “But I’m alive.”

 

==

 

The doctors don’t tell him anything about Reed, and Ben doesn’t see him. What little information he got from Sue is all he has to live on; he doesn’t see her again, either, and he assumes she’s with her brother. He doesn’t see anyone, and there’s no evidence to suggest anyone’s looking for him. Not that Ben’s in any position to be found: he feels like a human quilt of burns and stitches, raw and exposed as the burns and batters he received on so-called “planet Zero”. He’s become a veritable pincushion for Area 57 scientists as he heals, poked and prodded and questioned about everything he saw and felt, and as his memory returns he’s less privy to share any of it. They seem to have gotten a lot, though, from what he’s seen of his chart.

 

He travels through physical therapy alone, weak and wobbly after four weeks in a coma. He’s thankful that Reed was only out for a short time; the guy’s such a noodle, he wouldn’t even have been able to hold himself upright. (Even Ben had trouble with that one.) He likes to think he’s functioning fine, he’s been moved to a nice room with a view and he’s got access to the internet, although no means of contacting anyone. But he’s kept up at night worrying, missing Reed and wishing he knew what the hell happens next. He feels tired all the time, and he’s thankful he was never a really twitchy guy, because all the little movements cry out in pain. It reminds him of something, but he’s not sure what.

 

It’s four long weeks of healing later-- 8 weeks total since Reed called him at 2 am, and his skin is a patchwork of flaky dead skin and raw new skin when he finds Reed, or Reed finds him, or they find each other. Ben’s in a wheelchair, because despite all the steps he’s taken he still can’t stand on his two pins for long enough to get anywhere, but he’s been allowed the liberty of wheeling around the tiny library. Ben’s hoping to find some Jules Verne, not that he expects to. But he’s there, running his eyes along the spines of VE (it skips from VEN to VER without any consideration for anything in between) when someone says his name. He recognizes every cadence of their voice, and it makes his heart want to jump out of his chest. He’s frozen, his eyes fixed on _20,000 Leagues Under the Sea_ and his hands gripping the arms of his wheelchair tight enough to hurt.

 

“ _Ben_!” He tears his eyes away and forces his head around. Reed’s standing at the end of the row: he looks exhausted, his glasses crooked and dark circles prominent under his eyes. He’s on his feet, but he’s gripping the edge of the bookshelf like he badly needs the support.

 

“Reed,” Ben manages to say. Then, “You look like shit.” He can’t get the last words out properly; his breath hitches in his throat. Emotion’s swamping him faster than he can think.

 

At least Reed’s no better. Always the eloquent one, he only manages to choke out, “ _Jesus_ , Ben,” before he’s crossing the five feet between them and dropping onto his knees to hug him. It’s awkward with the wheelchair between them and Ben doesn’t remember the last time it was like this, with him taller and Reed’s face in his chest and Ben’s face in Reed’s hair, but he doesn’t want to let go, ever. He just feels like he was waiting for something terrible-- something absolutely horrible that would hurt worse than carving him up with a rusty knife, and Reed being here means it’s not happening. Whatever horrible thing he was waiting for is rendered void just by Reed’s presence.

 

Every horrible thing _ever_ is rendered void by Reed’s presence, actually. 9-11 and the Crusades and that one time in 8th grade a girl asked him out on a dare and laughed in his face are all null because Reed is _here_ , living and breathing and whispering apologies into Ben’s t-shirt.

 

When Reed looks up and their eyes meet, Reed’s eyes are wide and damp and Ben’s vision is blurry. Ben has things to say, so many things, _I love you_ and _I missed you_ chief on the list, but all that comes out of his mouth is, “I had this shitty dream that you took off and left me here alone, and I kept waiting for it to come true.”

 

Reed’s breath hitches at the confession. “Shit, Ben,” he says. “I’m sorry, I swear I’d never, I wouldn’t leave you, _ever_ \-- I didn’t even know where you were. I wouldn’t even have known you were alive if I hadn’t hacked your medical files--”

 

“Woa, jailbait, just shout it out there,” Ben says, cutting him off. Reed breaks off into a watery chuckle. He rubs at his eyes again, knocking his glasses even more askew; Ben confiscates them, avoiding smudging the lenses. He’s crying too, like a little kid, but he doesn’t have to worry about optometrist insurance that probably thinks he’s dead. Ben can’t look Reed in the eye anymore, though, as he folds his glasses closed. It happens like this: that Ben takes something a step further and can’t own up to himself, that whatever he did would be better punctuated with something he’s still afraid to do.

 

“Ben?” Reed says. He’s propped himself on Ben’s knees, probably suffering the same fatigue that has Ben in a wheelchair but determined to keep going. “Were you going to say something?”

 

“I--” Ben says. No, he wasn’t, he’s only got one thing to say and he’s never been brave enough to say it, because Reed’s never given any indication that he feels the same way and Ben can’t risk losing his best friend to it. “Reed, I--” He doesn’t know what could be worse: the possibility of losing Reed now, or the possibility that he’ll lose him to something worse and never have said it. Words were never his strength, he knows. Words were Reed’s job: actions were Ben’s.

 

Fuck.

 

He leans forward and catches Reed’s mouth with his own, putting every fear of ‘what then?’ out of his mind. Everything is this: Reed’s gasp of surprise when it happens, but he doesn’t pull away. He makes grabby hands for Ben’s waist, leaning upwards, and part of Ben’s smug brain is enjoying the sensation of leaning _down_ (enjoy it, it won’t last you short fuck) but a good 97% is preoccupied with joy.

 

They break apart to breathe, and when Reed blinks Ben realizes he’s still crying. They’re a pair of weepy idiots kissing in the middle of the library and Reed’s smiling and Ben’s smiling and he realizes that it’s going to be alright. They’ve always been that way: _right_.

 

“Well,” Ben says. “Shit.”

 

“I disagree,” Reed says. “But yeah. Shit.”

  
“Come on,” Ben says, offering Reed his glasses back. “Let’s get out of here, you can fill me in on all the stupid things you’ve done while I wasn’t around to keep you from dying.”

**Author's Note:**

> i was converted, like, yesterday. this is all Jo's fault. BENREED 4 LYFE i promise i said that ironically
> 
> Anyway, tell me what you think! and hit me up on tumblr @ witchalzey to yell about benreed or w/e BYE


End file.
